Ger­man cabi­net backs con­tin­ued mil­i­tary mis­sion in Afghanistan

Chan­cel­lor An­gela Merkel’s cabi­net yes­ter­day ap­proved the con­tin­u­a­tion of Ger­many’s de­ploy­ment of up to 980 sol­diers to Afghanistan through the end of 2017, a govern­ment spokesman said. The de­ci­sion, which must still be ap­proved by par­lia­ment, came less than a week after armed Tal­iban mil­i­tants stormed the Ger­man con­sulate in the north­ern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif and killed at least four Afghans and wounded more than 100 peo­ple. “With up to 980 sol­diers, the Ger­man army will in fu­ture ad­vise, sup­port and train Afghan se­cu­rity ser­vices,” said the govern­ment in a state­ment.

Ger­many, which heads the NATO-led Res­o­lute Sup­port mis­sion in north­ern Afghanistan, has its sol­diers sta­tioned on the out­skirts of Mazar-i-Sharif, and an­other 150 sol­diers in Kabul.

The NATO mis­sion in­cludes a to­tal of 13,000 for­eign troops from Ger­many, Italy, the United States and oth­ers. The NATO forces are fo­cused on train­ing the Afghan army and po­lice, not com­bat op­er­a­tions. Ger­many is also slated to pro­vide up to 1.7 bil­lion Eu­ros in civil­ian aid to Afghanistan through 2020.